“How many divisions does the Pope have?” was supposedly how Joseph Stalin dismissed the notion that the Vatican’s wishes should be taken into account.

The EU does not have many military divisions either, but it has something nearly as awesome. Authority over the world’s largest market and one of its biggest central banks gives the bloc a commercial power matching that of the US and unrivalled by anyone else. Yet Europe is either unaware of its own strength or fearful of wielding it.

Europeans’ basic instinct is still to treat trade and finance as means to mercantile ends — market access and predictable conditions for its businesses, and the jobs and incomes that are expected to follow. The EU is disinclined to use its economic clout for self-consciously political goals, which would require a willingness to put at risk commercial opportunities to serve a greater priority.